


Sunsets

by springwseok



Category: Pentagon (Korea Band)
Genre: Fluff, Friends to Lovers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-06
Updated: 2020-07-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:27:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25099138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/springwseok/pseuds/springwseok
Summary: "Now that Shinwon is looking at him, he notices the other smiling too as if mimicking his gesture. He also notices how nice that smile is, and how those eyes look so pretty under the golden sky."
Relationships: Ko Shinwon/Yeo Changgu | Yeo One
Comments: 10
Kudos: 34





	Sunsets

“Mom! I’m going out to play!” Shinwon screams across the living room, after he had completed his duties of the day and the sun was about to set in the horizon.

Outside, he could see through the windows, everything was starting to get a faint orange tone, the time of the day he liked the most. He hears his mom’s steps coming from the other room and already knows what she’s going to say even before she opens her mouth.

“Did you finish everything?”

“Yes, mom,” he says, almost automatically.

“Okay, darling.” She comes closer to leave a peck on his forehead. “You know the rules, right? Don’t go too far and-”

“Come back before it gets dark,” he completes, because he heard that more times than he can count.

“Yes,” his mother says and smiles at him while he leaves through the door.

Shinwon is fifteen years old, doesn’t have friends, and is a prince.

Not a very powerful prince from a huge kingdom, though. Their island is rather small, but his family likes to own the title, therefore his life is full of duties. He has a very strict schedule, filled with various lessons of various things, from learning multiple languages to horse riding. But his most expected hour of the day was the sunset. It was his free time, after a lot of negotiation with his mom. He could go outside and play wherever he wanted, as long as he didn’t go too far. He especially likes going to the little forest outside the fences of their castle. (It wasn’t really a castle, it was just a big house, but everyone in the island called it a castle. He doesn’t know why.)

As he walks there, everything is now fully illuminated by the orange sun rays, so bright he has to scrunch his eyes to avoid them from tearing up. He gets closer to the trees faster, afraid he’ll have little time to play that day. After a few minutes analysing the trees carefully, he finally chooses one to climb. It looks thick enough to hold his weight and the branches seem to be located in nice places. He loves climbing trees; it has a freeing feeling to it, Shinwon thinks. And he just goes, without second thoughts and in a little bit of a rush, not wanting to waste any second of that precious beautiful hour. As he climbs up the tree he can feel the wind on his face, ruffling his hair and tingling his skin. He’s getting higher and he can almost see the horizon clearly now, half of the sun is hidden behind the mountains while the other half shines bright as ever, and everything is beautiful and peaceful.

Until is isn’t, because Shinwon hears a voice coming somewhere from under him, saying “hey!”, and he looks down as a reflex, before putting any thought on it, and his foot is suddenly trapped in one of the branches, making him unbalance and fall from the tree with a scream.

“Oh! Oh my God, are you okay? I'm so sorry!” the voice says again, and Shinwon is so startled by the recent shock of falling that he doesn’t take his time to look at the owner’s voice properly. He grunts and tries to get up, failing miserably.

“Wait, I’m gonna help you!” the boy, Shinwon notices, is getting closer now and grabbing him by the arms to help him get up. “Do you feel any pain?”

“Well, of course I do. I just fell.”

“I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to startle you,” his voice is now low and little, and Shinwon feels bad for sounding so harsh.

“It’s okay. I was distracted,” he smiles faintly to reassure his words. Now that Shinwon is looking at him, he notices the other smiling too as if mimicking his gesture. He also notices how nice that smile is, and how those eyes look so pretty under the golden sky. Said eyes are now widen, suddenly, as if he had just realized something important.

“What?” Shinwon asks, the other’s hands who were still gripping at his arms loosened a bit, insecure.

“Are you… the prince?” the boy’s mouth opens in an o shape.

“Yeah… you don’t have to call me _the prince_ , though. My name’s Shinwon.”

“It’s… nice to meet you. My name is Changgu… I’m a healer! Well, not yet, but… I’m learning!” he says, ever so proudly, like this is the most important statement about himself.

Shinwon smiles, “Well, I think I’m lucky, then. My leg really hurts.”

“Oh! Yeah! I almost forgot! Yes. Let me help you. I'll take you back to the castle.”

“It’s really not a castle,” Shinwon laughs as they begin to walk, Changgu holding him by the shoulders to give support, “it’s just a house.”

“Well, it’s a really big house.” Changgu says matter of factly.

“Shinwon! What happened?” his mom almost screams, her voice full of worry, when the boys enter the house.

“I’m okay, mom. I fell from a tree,” he says as changgu carefully sits him on the nearest chair.

“Oh my God! How are you feeling? Did you break anything? Who’s your friend?” she’s all over the place now, desperately seeking for answers.

“I’m not his f-” Changgu starts saying but is interrupted by Shinwon right away.

“His name is Changgu. And my leg hurts a little bit, but Changgu can look at it. He’s a healer.”

“Really? Oh, that’s great! I’m afraid the doctor will take too long, but i’ll ask someone to go get him anyways! Just to be sure!” his mom sounds a little more relieved now.

“You know i’m still learning,” Changgu says almost in a whisper so only Shinwon could hear.

“I know you can do it. It’s probably nothing.”

“Okay… I’m gonna look at your leg,” he says as Shinwon’s mother sprints out of the room.

Changgu takes an attentive look at it, softly touching at some spots. No broken bones, no sprained ankles, only a dark bruise on his thigh from the impact of falling on top of it. He also finds a few scratches here and there, mostly on his arms, but nothing seems so serious.

“I don’t really think you need a doctor. You’ll recover soon!” he says, proud of his analysis.

“Yeah, i think so too. But my mom is going to call him anyways," the prince laughs.

“Well, she’s just worried. But you’re going to be fine!”

“Thank you, Changgu.” Shinwon smiles softly.

“I’m sorry I scared you,” Changgu says for the tenth time that day. “I just saw you around and really wanted to play with you. I don’t have many friends.”

“It’s okay,” Shinwon keeps smiling. “I don’t really have friends either. Unless you want to consider my tutors as friends? There’s also the horses…” Changgu giggles. “You can come back here and we can play when i’m feeling better.”

“Really?”

“Of course! My free time is around 5pm. We can do whatever we want!”

“Yes! I’ll come!”

And Changgu comes the next day, and the day after, and for all the following days for 3 years.

-

It is Shinwon’s eighteenth birthday.

Of course, as a prince, there is a long list of formalities he needs to fulfill. He wakes up early, eats breakfast with his family and receives a long and boring lecture from his dad about the responsibilities of an adult. He, now, can and needs to represent his parents anytime they can’t show up at an important meeting. He needs to attend various ceremonies and give some speeches here and there. But none of that bothers him. Turning eighteen, to anyone, could mean an important rite of passage or something, but to be honest, he had been preparing for this his whole life. He’s used to the schedules, the duties, the formalities. That’s why he doesn’t burden himself on making everything harder than it needs to be, and just goes for it.

He attends his own birthday party, of course, an overly big and unnecessarily dramatic ceremony. The sun is setting and the inside of the castle looks ten times more beautiful, golden everywhere, bright and strong. And shinwon is holding in just fine, keeping his façade of an important person and cordially talking to the guests, until he sees Changgu coming from the front door, golden like the sun, and breaks a huge smile at the sight. He can’t help but get out of his composed character when he waves excitedly at him like a happy puppy. He excuses himself and quietly runs in Changgu’s direction to meet him halfway through.

“Happy birthday!” Changgu says, hugging Shinwon tightly.

“Thanks,” the taller smiles, “I missed you.”

“We saw each other yesterday!” Changgu laughs.

“Hello, Changgu! How are you doing?” Shinwon’s mom comes from behind them and hugs Changgu’s side.

His mom learned how to love Changgu like another son, and the boy had become very comfortable around Shinwon’s family and at the castle. Shinwon was very much satisfied with that. He really wanted to keep Changgu as close as he could.

“I’m great, ma’am! How are you?”

“I’m great too. Shinwon is also great, I believe. Way better now that you’re here,” she says with a kind smile and changgu looks expectantly at the other boy.

“Absolutely. Now i can talk to someone about something that doesn’t involve management or statistics.” the three of them laugh at that.

Shinwon’s mom seems to think for a second before saying, “Well, Shinwon, you’ve done great today. I think you can take a break now.” She blinks at the boys.

“Thank you, mom!” the prince says excitedly and kisses her cheek before grabbing his friend’s hand and dragging him inside, towards the kitchen.

“Changgu, I really want to bake a cake,” the prince says a few minutes before the sky goes dark.

“What? You never cooked anything in your life,” Changgu says, laughing, and Shinwon rolls his eyes.

“That’s why I want to do it with you. Come on, it’ll be fun!”

“Okay, then… let’s do it.”

That’s how they find themselves covered in flour, laughing loudly and making a mess, as always. Spending time with Changgu had become the highlight of Shinwon’s days. In their three years of friendship, it had never been difficult, never annoying, never bothersome. always nice, always easy, always joyful. Changgu was the perfect friend (yes, Shinwon doesn’t have any standards but he knows that if he had more friends, Changgu would be the best out of them), infinitely and naturally kind, always coming up with the most creative ideas for them to spend time together, caring and bright.

“Why did you came with this idea out of nowhere?” the shorter of them asks when the chocolate cake is in the oven.

“I don’t know? I just wanted to do something with you.”

“We always do something together, Won.”

“I know,” he smiles and Changgu smiles back at him.

They keep looking at each other for a second too long and shinwon feels like there’s something else there now. He doesn’t quite know yet, but it doesn’t necessarily bothers him either. He knows Changgu had grown more and more special to him over the years, and he hopes it’ll stay this way for a long time.

“Okay, but we really need to clean this kitchen before your mom shows up to check in on us.” Changgu states.

“Yeah,” the other laughs, “I know.”

“So, are you enjoying your birthday?” the shorter of them asks while they wash the pans and utensils they used to bake the cake.

“Of course! Although the first part of the day was… a little boring. But it got way better when you came.”

“Of course I’d come! I love you, Shinwon.” he says and Shinwon’s hands stop for two seconds halfway through turning on the faucet.

He looks at Changgu with a smile growing in his lips and the other boy, who had his eyes widen in shock for spilling that out for the first time so easily, smiles back and continues speaking, faster than before.

“I mean… yeah, I came to all your previous birthdays since we were fifteen, so… of course I’d come to this one. Eighteen is… special. I think.”

“It is special.” Shinwon says simply. It really is.

The next day Shinwon wakes up and runs straight to the bathroom. His stomach hurts terribly and he stays in bed for the rest of the day, unable to do anything. Until Changgu comes, again, with a little glass container with herbs inside, some type of medicine he had made for him.

“How did you know i had a stomach ache? Are you a psychic besides from a being a healer?”

Changgu just laughs it off, “No. I just figured, since we ate the whole cake yesterday!”

“Oh my God, we really did, didn’t we?” he wipes imaginary sweat out of his forehead dramatically. “Well, I don’t regret it a single bit.”

That night, before going to sleep, Shinwon takes the last sip of the medicine, leaving the little bottle empty. He furrows his brows when he finds a piece of paper peeking out, glued on the bottom of it. He unglues it and opens the note, and finds a message written with a neat handwriting. “I really treasure you. Get better soon!” he smiles.

During the rest of that year, Shinwon finds himself really seeking for more little notes from Changgu. to the point that he fakes getting sick, tells him he has the flu every once in a while, or a fever, or a headache, just to get one more note. And they do keep coming, a few messages longer than others, all of them sweet. Sweet and kind just like Changgu. If shinwon tries hard enough he can almost picture Changgu in his bedroom, taking his time to write the words beautifully every time he requested for medicine. They never mentioned it, though. It was almost like a secret admirer situation, except he knew exactly who was sending them. And he loves it.

-

Now they’re nineteen, and it’s Changgu’s turn to be sick.

He hadn’t shown up in the castle that day, and Shinwon just had to postpone his duties for a while to go check on him. He finds the boy lying down on his bed, burning from fever.

“I don’t know how to help… I’m not a healer like you. What do you want me to do?” he says, voice worried.

“Won, it’s okay. I took some medicine already, and my mom made soup. I’m fine! Just… stay here with me, okay?”

“Yeah, of course.”

The sun is setting outside and the orange rays break through the bedroom’s windows and illuminate changgu’s brown eyes, making them look like golden gems. Shinwon recalls fondly the first time he saw those eyes, ever so beautiful.

After a minute, he breaks the silence. “You know, all this time we’ve been friends, you never got sick.”

“Yeah. And you’ve been sick _too many times_. Honestly, I was starting to get really worried when you started having the flu once a month.”

Shinwon smiles. “I didn’t have the flu once a month. Actually, I think I didn’t have the flu at all this year.”

Changgu gets up, now sitting in the bed, brows furrowed in confusion. “What? What do you mean? I took care of you and gave you medicine this whole time!”

Shinwon’s smile gets bigger with each word. “Exactly. I really wanted you to give me medicine.”

Changgu looks like he's having a fever dream, almost literally. “I don’t get it. Why would you want medicine if you were not sick?” he’s now suspicious, arms crossed in front of his chest.

“For the love of God, Changgu.” Was he really not realizing was shinwon was trying to say? it must be the fever, Shinwon decides. “The notes. The little notes you left for me on the bottom of the containers. Little cute notes telling me to take care, that my hair was looking nice that day, that you wanted to hold my hand, that you-”

“Okay, okay! Stop! I remember!” Changgu waved his arms frantically, begging for shinwon to shut up, red from the fever and red from embarrassment.

Shinwon just laughs, “What’s wrong? I liked them.”

“You did?” Changgu sounds so dreamy, his voice light and soft, honey eyes scrunching from his smile. “Wait,” his expression changes in a blink of an eye, brows furrowing again, “I thought you weren’t getting them. You didn’t say anything.” Again, his face changes to a slight pout and heavy eyes, and Shinwon doesn’t know if it’s an effect of the fever but he thinks Changgu looks ten times cuter like this.

“I didn’t say anything because… I was confused.” Shinwon looks straight into the his friend’s eyes. “I had never liked anyone. I mean… I never had time to think about it. My mom always says that I’ll probably marry a princess someday and that made me think that love wasn’t a real thing. If I’m… somehow made for marrying a random princess I've never met, then where’s the love in that? I never found it. But then… you came and we became friends so fast, and for the longest time I thought that was enough.” Changgu is now looking attentively at him, a bit of that dreamy expression from before now sprinkled in his face again. “Remember my eighteenth birthday? We baked a cake together and you said you loved me… you got all flustered after it and I thought “there’s more to this, isn’t it?”... and I almost said I loved you back that day. But again, it was so new to me, I was afraid I didn’t know the repercussions of a sentence like that. And you just… I think you got tired of me being absolutely oblivious and started writing me those notes.”

“Yeah, that was exactly it.” Changgu says, only half serious because he can’t hold a laughter for too long.

Shinwon laughs along, light-heartedly. “After the first one, when I had a stomach ache after we ate all that cake, I just had to see if you would keep doing it. And I loved that you did. And I realized that I loved you. I _love_ you.”

Shinwon is so red, but Changgu is redder, and now they’re a giggling mess and can’t look at each other properly.

“I’m sorry I took this long to say this.”

Changgu looks at him fondly, “It’s okay.”

And Shinwon just can’t believe his best friend has always been right there, being the love of his life, and he took so long to notice. He decides he doesn’t want to waste not a single second more, and adjusts his position to sit cross legged in front of Changgu, gently grabbing his face in his hands.

“I want to kiss you so bad.” Changgu’s eyes widen, almost comically.

“But I’m sick…”

“I don’t care.” He comes closer, the other boy can feel his breath on his own lips now.

“Can I?”

“Yes,” the shorter says and even the tip of his ears are dark red from shyness and Shinwon thinks he looks so cute like that, he can’t help but to smile wide.

Their lips connect then, and it’s such a soft peck that one could find it hard to believe the amount of emotion it was carrying. But they both know the explosion-like feeling growing inside their chest. They break the contact just to look at each other again and Changgu’s hand goes straight in the direction of Shinwon’s hair like a second nature, caressing the soft locks gently.

He giggles, “I always wanted to do that.”

Shinwon smiles, grabbing Changgu’s free hand in his own. “I know. You wrote it on a note once.” And Changgu giggles a little bit more.

“Do you remember all of them?”

“Of course. The one i like the most is… when I told you I had a stomach ache for the second time, you wrote me “you have the most beautiful smile”.”

“Well, it’s true.”

“I disagree. You’re the owner of the most beautiful smile here.”

“Gross…” Changgu says, and flashes the biggest grin right after.

“See?” Shinwon says as to prove a point, and kisses Changgu’s smile right in the spot.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading !! this was my first one-shot that i wrote just to test the waters. please leave me a comment╰(*´︶`*)╯


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